Erosion of north Wicklow coast. Possible cause: Greystones Harbour Development?

legrand

Walked North Beach at weekend. Had not been down since the storms and find beach effectively inaccessable at mid to high tide. Even the rock armor has been striped of smaller rocks/stones making it difficult for some and impossible for most to traverse. Assuming you get that far you then have a 4 or 5 meter scramble to get the beach level.

Further on, the foundations of the Gap bridge are now exposed and the outflow pipe prototrudes some meters out at height of about 3-4 meters from beach level (I recall that pipe being about a meter off the ground when the Gap bridge was intact).

Please be mindful of the tides - I had to make a hasty retreat from a point beyond the Gap bridge (new name?- 'sludge hill') when a series of waves came within a few meters of the cliff base.

Fiachra2

From looking at it last Sunday and checking the (admittedly slightly contrary) tide app on my phone, I would say it is only accessible for about a couple of hours each side low tide now.

legrand

A lot of truck movements down Darcy's Field way. Last weekend a digger created a shallow trench more or less parallel with shore between 10-20 metres in land. Looked like possible prep works possibly related to moving the fencing inland. Might get a chance to look closer over the weekend - anyone else please feel to comment.

Now why would they move fencing in by 20 meters?
1. That should last a couple of years before erosion forces another change
2. If that is the case then no immediate plans for coastal protection (armour or nourishment).

Here's a thought.
As it stands there is no access to the North beach accept at low tide (and this in itself is unacceptable on a number of fronts - please have local candidates justify that). The current situation has arisen due to recent storms having lowered the beach level by at least 2-3 meters in and around the rock armour (rocks would also appear to have been shifted toward the sea preventing beach access further).

The Beach level should rise again although not clear how long that will take - but that aside, if we assume WCC/Sisk do place rock armour in line with current setup and same extends to where the Gap bridge was - I personally don't this is a good plan. In effect that entire stretch of beach between the Gap bridge and harbour will be lost. (As I write I'm reminded of those days when I could swim at any point from the Gap bridge back up as far Sweeneys).

This is the controversial bit..
Remove coastline to a depth of ~10-15meters (maybe use the all that soil to fill in the large hole excavated in Darcy's) on that stretch to the Gap bridge and step back the Armour. This setup should therefore mean that at least that section of the North beach remains a beach and one that remains accessible. I'd rather this than a poorly maintained field masquerading‎ as a park (if they won't maintain the Burnaby Park or St Crispin cell why on earth should we believe WCC would ever maintain a park near the beach?).

Jimjay

legrand wrote: »

A lot of truck movements down Darcy's Field way. Last weekend a digger created a shallow trench more or less parallel with shore between 10-20 metres in land. Looked like possible prep works possibly related to moving the fencing inland. Might get a chance to look closer over the weekend - anyone else please feel to comment.

Now why would they move fencing in by 20 meters?
1. That should last a couple of years before erosion forces another change
2. If that is the case then no immediate plans for coastal protection (armour or nourishment).

Here's a thought.
As it stands there is no access to the North beach accept at low tide (and this in itself is unacceptable on a number of fronts - please have local candidates justify that). The current situation has arisen due to recent storms having lowered the beach level by at least 2-3 meters in and around the rock armour (rocks would also appear to have been shifted toward the sea preventing beach access further).

The Beach level should rise again although not clear how long that will take - but that aside, if we assume WCC/Sisk do place rock armour in line with current setup and same extends to where the Gap bridge was - I personally don't this is a good plan. In effect that entire stretch of beach between the Gap bridge and harbour will be lost. (As I write I'm reminded of those days when I could swim at any point from the Gap bridge back up as far Sweeneys).

This is the controversial bit..
Remove coastline to a depth of ~10-15meters (maybe use the all that soil to fill in the large hole excavated in Darcy's) on that stretch to the Gap bridge and step back the Armour. This setup should therefore mean that at least that section of the North beach remains a beach and one that remains accessible. I'd rather this than a poorly maintained field masquerading‎ as a park (if they won't maintain the Burnaby Park or St Crispin cell why on earth should we believe WCC would ever maintain a park near the beach?).

Is this not in preparation for the beach nourishment / erosion measures that the developer said it had agreed to start a few days ago?

From this week until May approximately the mammoth task of seeding the North Beach to at least slow but hopefully prevent the continuous erosion that has been of great concern to Greystones residents http://www.greystonesguide.ie/tag/david-oreilly/

legrand

^^^
oh? Did not hear about that! Where can I find that info/press release?

Jimjay

legrand wrote: »

^^^
oh? Did not hear about that! Where can I find that info/press release?

http://www.greystonesguide.ie/tag/david-oreilly/

legrand

Well, well

Taltos

Any coincidence the beach nourishment is happening now?

recedite

I don't think they will be too worried about the erosion along the proposed park and at the missing Gap Bridge. More likely the surveyors spotted on the Sisk site recently reported back that the site was shrinking alarmingly. They will want to preserve the site's integrity until after the apartments get built. Then the problem of the erosion will become an ongoing problem between the apartment's management company and WCC.
We'll see whereabouts they dump the gravel. I think it will be between the Sisk fence and the sea, not up at the Gap Bridge area.

loyatemu

can they not do it from the sea? Irish Rail did this when reinforcing Bray Head.

gibbon6

Jimjay wrote: »

http://www.greystonesguide.ie/tag/david-oreilly/

This is indeed a most bizarre and perplexing press release from would be blueshirt councilor David O'Reilly :mad:

He apparently had a chat with some un-named individual working for Sisks who he met while walking the beach. Who the hell is this mysterious individual and what authority does have in the Sisks power structure.

In this press release Mr O'Reilly talks about "seeding the North Beach" as if this is somehow good news. Are Sisks about to engage in a massif planting exercise to try and grow some kind of anti coastal erosion type plant life on the ruins of the north beach???

There is talk of a "huge number of truck movements" doing what he doesn't say. There is no mention of what these trucks will be carrying. Will Sisks be putting the capital beach nourishment of 20k cubic metres on the beach which should have been placed 5 years ago?

I am very unimpressed and perplexed by this unacceptable press release from Mr O'Reilly who really needs to get real and stop listening to the likes of the puddle man Derek Mitchell for his own good.

F3

gibbon6 wrote: »

This is indeed a most bizarre and perplexing press release from would be blueshirt councilor David O'Reilly :mad:

He apparently had a chat with some un-named individual working for Sisks who he met while walking the beach. Who the hell is this mysterious individual and what authority does have in the Sisks power structure.

In this press release Mr O'Reilly talks about "seeding the North Beach" as if this is somehow good news. Are Sisks about to engage in a massif planting exercise to try and grow some kind of anti coastal erosion type plant life on the ruins of the north beach???

There is talk of a "huge number of truck movements" doing what he doesn't say. There is no mention of what these trucks will be carrying. Will Sisks be putting the capital beach nourishment of 20k cubic metres on the beach which should have been placed 5 years ago?

I am very unimpressed and perplexed by this unacceptable press release from Mr O'Reilly who really needs to get real and stop listening to the likes of the puddle man Derek Mitchell for his own good.

And so the the circle of life perpetuates itself. A new generation of talk shops are born......

legrand

Taken Sunday 9th..

fat-tony

Dang - you beat me to it legrand :P Taken today between dodging trucks! Must have been 8 or 9 different trucks delivering aggregate.

recedite

Oh, quelle surprise!!
They are dumping all the gravel only between the Sisk site and the sea

fat-tony

Why the surprise? According to various earlier posts the beach "nourishment" is to extend only as far as the Gap Bridge. I'm assuming this is the initial beach nourishment:

5.5.1 Capital nourishment: It will be necessary to place some initial beach nourishment to minimise the impact of initial changes to the coastline during construction. It is proposed that 30,000 m3 will be placed during the construction of the breakwaters.

Presumably the Gap Bridge northwards will be done later? It's a start isn't it?

From the camera viewpoint in my prior photo there is only rock armour to the right which extends to the low water mark and behind the camera is the beach created by the extension of the rocks beyond the north breakwater. See this photo :

recedite

fat-tony wrote: »

Presumably the Gap Bridge northwards will be done later?

Don't hold your breath waiting for it

Maudi

legrand wrote: »

Taken Sunday 9th..

Wow.super pictures showing astonishing rate of erosion.

fat-tony

Maudi wrote: »

Wow.super pictures showing astonishing rate of erosion.

No - it's a photo showing what they are doing to try and combat the erosion;) Glass half-full time!

F3

I'm truly happy to see action at last at the north beach. Tom Fortune told me that they are supposed to be dropping about 1000 loads [which is circa 8000 cubic metres]. I'd like to think that pressure from community groups like this have kicked WCC into action. Well done to all.....

gibbon6

So far all they seem to have done is build a type of a hard core road at the base of the rapidly eroding cliffs. However the material they are using is not the type of rounded shingle found on a natural beach used for recreational purposes. The type of stones they are supposed to nourish the beach with was covered in great detail at the second Bord Pleanala oral hearing in 2007. We all need to keep a very close eye on these scoundrels who will do whatever they can to value engineer a cheap and nasty solution to paper over the disaster their development has created.

fat-tony

gibbon6 wrote: »

... The type of stones they are supposed to nourish the beach with was covered in great detail at the second Bord Pleanala oral hearing in 2007 ...

Have you got a link for that?

gibbon6

fat-tony wrote: »

Have you got a link for that?

The following is an extract from the Bord Pleanala's Inspectors Report dated May 2007 available on their website which summarises statements made by the developer regarding beach nourishment material. Note that the beach nourishment material should match the current beach material.

http://www.pleanala.ie/documents/reports/EF2/REF2016B.pdf

In relation to obtaining suitable material for beach nourishment the developers investigated potential quarry sources including samples taken around Ireland and in Wales. It is intended to use material which matches the current beach material as closely as is practicable of the samples looked at. The Wicklow sample from Ballyhorsey would be the better match.

Some replenishment work was done on Bray seafront a few years ago. The material used there was dredged from the Codling Bank so it is pretty much the same material. The Ballyhorsey material is suitable as beach nourishment material. There is sufficient quantity available for the required 30 years of supply.

pixbyjohn

North Beach, Greystones, 13/03/2014 by pixbyjohn, on Flickr

legrand

Over the last few days I notice more truck loads of 'nourishment' being deposited not on the beach but over the rock armour itself - pic below shows beginning of that -a lot more has been added this week).

The storms stripped out the rock armour - perhaps this is to reinstate some solidity (that a word?) and maybe even to 'nourish' lost beach front in front of
armour?

thoughts?

pixbyjohn wrote: »

North Beach, Greystones, 13/03/2014 by pixbyjohn, on Flickr

recedite

They are only trying to protect their site until the houses get built and sold. Nothing more. That green fence in the photo is their third fence; two others have already fallen into the sea, so that's about 4 metres already shaved off the site.

Its going to be an ongoing nightmare for future generations of people living there, trying to fight back the sea. Who will pay for ongoing works after Sisk have moved on? The residents? WCC? National government? Nobody?

Scientific climate predictions all agree on two things; rising sea levels and also increased storm frequency in the future.

Fiachra2

The beach in front of the rock armour has, like the rest of the beach dropped dramatically in height. Hence you can no longer access the north beach except at low tide. Presumably they are now attempting to build up the beach to prevent the rock armour sliding downwards (which it has done at its northern end).

This is beginning to resemble the efforts of King Canute!

It is also noticeable that the "beach nourishment" they put in place a few weeks ago further north (see Johns photos) is disappearing rapidly. I didn't take any photos but I would guess 50% or more is gone at this stage. Maybe John can provide some before and after photos to illustrate?

gibbon6

Fiachra2 wrote: »

The beach in front of the rock armour has, like the rest of the beach dropped dramatically in height. Hence you can no longer access the north beach except at low tide. Presumably they are now attempting to build up the beach to prevent the rock armour sliding downwards (which it has done at its northern end).

This is beginning to resemble the efforts of King Canute!

It is also noticeable that the "beach nourishment" they put in place a few weeks ago further north (see Johns photos) is disappearing rapidly. I didn't take any photos but I would guess 50% or more is gone at this stage. Maybe John can provide some before and after photos to illustrate?

It's hardly surprising that most of the material has been washed away. It was from a quarry, not like the natural beach. The historical site at Rathdown is now at risk of destruction as the cliffs erode rapidly.

F3

I believe that they have their models wrong from the start. And I believe their secondary models were based upon their primary models which compounded the error.


My father-in-law, is in his 80's and in his youth was a local greystones fisherman, all his bothers were fishermen, and his father was a boat builder and fisherman, and he knows the waters around the tide like the back of his hand. I recently brought him up to see what has happened to the north beach, and he was horrified. He understand the ebb and flow of the local running tides and he said that the rock groin north of the pier is completely wrong. Never has their been scouring to the extend that he witnessed on the north beach. He said it's too late to do anything, the damage has been done. Any effort now is just lipstick on the gorilla.

LEIN

recedite wrote: »

They are only trying to protect their site until the houses get built and sold. Nothing more. That green fence in the photo is their third fence; two others have already fallen into the sea, so that's about 4 metres already shaved off the site.

Its going to be an ongoing nightmare for future generations of people living there, trying to fight back the sea. Who will pay for ongoing works after Sisk have moved on? The residents? WCC? National government? Nobody?

Scientific climate predictions all agree on two things; rising sea levels and also increased storm frequency in the future.

Some tinfoil hats will be needed soon... :P